Siraitia

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Siraitia

Description

Perennial herbaceous climbers with sub or supra-terraneous tuber (always?), leaves and stems with blackish glandular hairs; Leaves: Flowers: Fruit ± fleshy, indehiscent, subglobose to cylindric, rather large (5-11 cm long), smooth; Seeds numerous, broadly ovate or subcircular in outline, compressed, faces smooth, with broad finely radiatingly ribbed, corky, double or 3-ridged margin, edge (sub)entire.

Distribution

Asia-Tropical: Thailand (Thailand present), NE India present, South & Central China present, West Malesia present
A genus of three or four species distributed in NE India,South & Central China, Thailand, Indochina and West Malesia; in Malesia 1 species.

Uses

Siraitia grosvenorii (Swingle) A.M.Lu & Zhi Y.Zhang does not occur in our region, but its fruits are sold in Chinese shops and local markets in Malesia for its sweet medicinally used fruits (). The female flowers depicted are taken from Chinese material, because female flowers of the genus from the Malesian area are not known.

Citation

W.J.de Wilde & Duyfjes 2006 – In: Blumea: 499